Nope. Couldn't do it. I was geared up for an in-depth discussion of A Dance with Dragons and all the enthusiasm ebbed away. I got a big slice of 'what's the point' served up and gobbled it down.

It's a well-written book that kills of characters and a big chuck of my enthusiasm for the series. Unless he kills off Daenerys in the next book, and despite the prayers of many I doubt he'd do that, I don't know how he can make things more bleak. I hate bleak. I suspect we're heading for a fantasy novel equivalent of Dawn of the Dead. That's fine, so long as you have a protagonist you can root for. We're fresh out of that, for me.

Anyway, got about six pages done for my next short story. I'm going to have to trim or re-write about three of them but that's the way the game goes sometimes.

On the good side, I'm reading Soul Hunter by Aaron Dembski-Bowden and I am really impressed. He writes in the Warhammer 40k universe but his media books do not suck. Along with Dan Abnett, he's one of the only authors I feel comfortable reccomending unreservedly. He has a gift for finding the humanity in his characters. I like that. "He reminds me of me," he said with humility. Seriously, check him out if you like Warhammer 40 or just like military Sci-fi...or just sci-fi in general. He's that good. I may have a review up for Soul Hunter soon.